Book I, Chapter 29

Chapter Xxix

On Chance and Fortune.1

It seems pertinent to what has been said to inquire in the same way about chance and fortune. For many concede these things, and many likewise deny them. Democritus and Epicurus and their followers, far from merely conceding them, even attribute excessive dignity to them. They say that all things come about by chance or fortuitously, as is clear from the twenty-seventh of this work. Hence the ancient Sallust too says: "Surely fortune rules in every matter." Nearly all the Philosophers, the Poets and the common people also concede these things. Aristotle concedes them at length in Physics 2, in his book On Good Fortune, and in many other places. Avicenna too, Algazel, Averroes and Boethius concede them. Ovid also, in the Art of Love: "Chance prevails everywhere; let your hook always be hanging; in the pool where you least believe it, there will be a fish." The same poet in the Letters from Pontus: "All human things hang by a slender thread; and by sudden chance, what had prevailed collapses."

There are many other such sayings in the Poets. The common people likewise assert these things, as the adverbs of doubt show, which are inserted almost constantly in every manner of speech.2 The sacred writings also do not keep silent about chance. Hence 2 Kings 1: "I came by chance to Mount Gilboa";E1 and 3 Kings, last chapter: a certain man, aiming an arrow at random, struck the king of Israel by chance. And Ecclesiastes 9: "I saw that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to the learned, nor favor to the skilled, but time and chance in all things." The ancient Gentiles too, and especially the Egyptians and Romans, worshipped Fortune as a goddess, as many histories relate. Some of the Jews, turned away from the Lord, also worshipped her on occasion; of these Isaiah 65 says: "You who have forsaken the Lord, who set a table for Fortune,E2 etc., I will number you for the sword." And how often are adverbs of doubt set down in Sacred Scripture, all of which seem to belong to fortune.

The Stoics, on the contrary, deny chance and fortune altogether, affirming that all things are done by fate and divine providence. Certain ancients also agree with them, likewise doing away with fortune and chance, since each of the things that happen can be traced back to some determinate and certain cause, as the Philosopher briefly recalls in Physics 2, 42.3 Certain Catholic Doctors also seem to agree with these. So that these, who are as it were contrary extremes, may be brought back to a mean of concord, it should be known that all who speak of chance and fortune say that they occur when something happens beside the intention of the agent. This is clear from the authors named and from the common conception of all who speak of them. Now that something happens beside the intention of the agent can be thought of in two ways. Either it happens wholly beside the intention of any agent whatever, so that it is intended simply by no one; or it happens beside the intention of some particular cause, or of any inferior cause. The first can be called simply a matter of chance or fortuitous; the second, only in a certain respect. Therefore nothing is simply a matter of chance, nor fortuitous, but only in a certain respect; and thus the conflict spoken of above is removed. That nothing is a matter of chance simply, nor fortuitous, is shown in this way. Nothing that happens by purpose and from the intention of an agent is simply a matter of chance or fortuitous; but everything that happens, happens by purpose and from the intention of an agent. Now astrologers hold that this agent is the heaven, or heavenly power, which by a fixed reason and determinate causation produces all things, even those that seem to be fortuitous. Hence they also call certain planets "fortunate," indeed "fortunes," namely the Sun and Moon.4 The Part of Fortune too is reckoned to have the greatest force in nativities, in the beginnings of undertakings, and in all human affairs; wherefore it is held to be the most excellent of all the parts. Hence they also assign it the tenth house as its essential house.5 By day this Part is taken from the Sun to the Moon, by night the reverse, and it is cast from the ascendant.

On this Albumazar too writes, in the eighth of the Greater Introduction,B1 third differentia, as follows:6 "The property of its signification is to signify the soul and fortune, the powers of the one and of the other; and it signifies life and bodies, substance and advancement, and fortune, enrichment too and poverty, gold and silver, usefulness and weightiness, praise in the forum and good repute, the exaltation of the native, and of kingdom and principate; and it signifies the rich, and honor, exaltation too, and good and evil, the present and the absent, the apparent and the hidden; it signifies also the intention and the beginning of works and of things. And this Part is set before all the parts, just as the Sun is set before all the planets by its splendor, and it is itself loftier and more precious than all the parts." And perhaps this is why goods of this kind are very often called "goods of fortune" by many, even by Philosophers. Others, namely the ancient Gentiles, thought there was one goddess who distributes or withdraws all such goods at the pleasure of her will, without any reason; and so they had painted her blind, and they called her Fortune. But both of these views are refuted by what was set out in the immediately preceding chapter of this work and in the chapters above. They are refuted especially if the Astrologers hold that human acts are subject by necessity to the heavenly power, or that this power does anything at all without God specifically intending the same and likewise doing it. What then is that agent which does everything from a fixed intention and determinate purpose, and brings about all things, if not God? He is the first agent of all agents, and does all things according to the purpose and intention of his own will, as the twenty-eighth and the twenty-seventh of this work show.

Again, chance and fortune are causes per accidens, as is clear from Physics 2; and every cause per accidens is reduced to some cause per se, as the second of this work shows,7 and every cause per se to God. God, therefore, is the first cause of these things; and he is so not rashly and of necessity, but according to the purpose of his own will. But lest I appear singular in this opinion, behold the many Philosophers and Theologians who hold it. For Aristotle in Physics 2, among the opinions recounted about chance and fortune, shows how that opinion has truth which holds that nothing comes about from Fortune. He says that Fortune is the cause of nothing simply, but only per accidens, in these words: "And so nothing will indeed seem to come about from Fortune. For they say all these things rightly, since it is indeed reasonable that something be from Fortune; for it comes about by accident, and Fortune is a cause as an accident, but as a cause simply, of nothing; just as the builder is indeed the cause of a house, but the flute-player by accident." That all Fortune is reduced to God is clear from the same Aristotle in On the World, last chapter.8 There he shows how God, though he is one, is nevertheless of many names, from all the effects which he brings about, as he explains by induction; and at the end he says this: "and, speaking in sum, he is to be called heavenly and earthly, and by every Nature and Fortune, as being himself the cause of all." And below he says that God is called heimarmenē because he binds together and separates, and Nemesis from the distribution made to each; and these seem to belong to Fortune.E19 Hence Damascene too, in 39 Sent., explains heimarmenē by Fortune.10

Aristotle proves this more expressly in his book On Good Fortune,11 where he recites five opinions about it: that it comes from God, from Nature, from the outcome of events, from reason, and from appetite. He proceeds by disputation about these. And in chapter 2 he rejects the last two opinions, first that about appetite. Since there is some cause of that appetite, it is either nature or fortune. If nature, then it is more properly called a cause of it than fortune, and such a man would be called more well-natured than well-fortuned. If fortune is the cause of it, then fortune will be the cause of all human acts, since it will be the cause of there being understanding and deliberating. And he adds, arguing: "For the one deliberating did not deliberate before he deliberated, but there is a certain principle; nor did the one understanding understand before he understood, and so on to infinity. Therefore of that which is understanding, intellect is not the principle, nor is counsel the principle of deliberating. What then other than fortune? And so all things are from fortune." And he answers, saying: "Either there is some principle outside of which there is no other, or, because it is such according to being, it can make such. But what is sought is this: What is the principle of motion in the soul? Plainly, as in the whole, God; for the divine in us in some way moves all things. The principle of reason, however, is not reason, but something better; what then will be better than knowledge and intellect, if not God? For virtue is the instrument of intellect. And on account of this, as was said formerly,12 those are called well-fortuned who, if they make an onset, succeed though acting without reason, and for whom it is not expedient to deliberate. For they have a principle of such a kind that it is better than intellect and counsel; but those who have reason do not have this, nor divine instincts." And in the first chapter he says: "In the soul there is such a nature as that by which we are borne with impulse, without reason, to those things in which we shall surely fare well. And if someone were to ask one in that condition why it pleases him to do this, 'I do not know,' he says, 'but it pleases me,' experiencing something like what is done by God." For, carried by God, they have an impulse without reason to do something. In Rhetoric 2, chapter 23,13 treating of the goods of Fortune and of the well-fortuned, he also says: "They are more unpremeditating because of good fortune. One excellent trait of good fortune is asserted: that they are lovers of God and bear themselves toward the divine, believing in some measure on account of the good things done by Fortune." But why this, unless God were the Author of Fortune?

In Ethics 10, 14,14 he also recites a threefold opinion about how men become good, saying thus: "Some think that men become good by nature, others by habit, others by teaching." And in determining the truth of the first opinion, he says: "That which is of nature, it is plain, is not in our power, but exists through some divine cause, as it does in the truly well-fortuned." On this Averroes says: "Some men are thought to be good by nature; and what in this is by nature is not from us, but is through a certain divine grace for those whose fortune is truly good." Avicenna likewise, in Metaphysics 10, 1,15 says: "The principle of all benefits is from divine care; and you should know that the common people come nearer to it, and hold it, and say: It is true; and none shrink from this except those who want to seem Philosophers, because they are ignorant of the causes and occasions of these things." And speaking of adversities and prosperities, alms and sins and the like, he says: "The cause of all these is not here but from there: the principles of all these come back to nature, will, or chance. The principle of nature, however, is there; but our wills are after they were not; and whatever is, after it was not, has a cause; therefore our every will has a cause. The cause of this will, however, does not extend to infinity, but to certain things that happen from outside, earthly or heavenly; and earthly things lead back to heavenly. The aggregate of all these therefore comes about of necessity from the necessity of the divine will; chance, however, arises from the concourse of all these. For when you have resolved all things, they will be reduced to those whose necessity depends solely on God Almighty; and the judgment of God is the first simple positing."

Boethius also hints at this in his Exposition of the first of On Interpretation, in the place cited above. There he distinguishes a threefold animal, namely one subject to nature,D1 to Heaven, and to reason with free choice of will; and having explained the first two kinds, he says of the third: "Which kind we all are, subject to divine providence; we also depend on the very will of *D2the gods.1617 And so neither is the necessity of heavenly things wholly overturned, nor does this discussion eliminate chance from things." By this he indicates, as it seems, that in things there is chance with respect to particular and inferior causes, but not with respect to divine providence and will, to which we are subject in all things and on which we depend in all. He makes this plain more fully and expressly in the fifth book of the Consolation of Philosophy, first prose: "If indeed," he says, "anyone were to define chance as an event produced by a random motion and by no connection of causes, I affirm that there is no chance at all." Behold, nothing is simply a matter of chance, because nothing is beside God's intention; and the following text shows this: "For with God constraining all things into order, what room can any longer be left for rashness?"

And having recited Aristotle's definition of Chance, and set out the example of the man digging the ground for the sake of tilling a field and finding a hidden treasure, he says: "The digging of the ground and the hiding of the treasure are, by chance, causes of a gain, that is, Chance, which comes about from causes meeting one another and converging, not from the intention of the agent; nor did the man who buried the gold, or the man who worked the field, intend that this money be found." It is clear therefore, according to him, that nothing is called simply a matter of chance, but only with respect to some particular cause, or with respect to inferior causes. His following words also make this plainer, when he says: "It is evident, then, that one may define Chance as the unexpected event, from converging causes, in matters done for the sake of something else; and that causes meet and converge is brought about by that order proceeding with inevitable connection, which, descending from the fount of providence, disposes all things in their times and places." The poem that follows also makes this plain by way of example.18

A1 This also plainly seems to be the opinion of Augustine, Retractations 1, 1, who says: "I am not pleased that I so often named fortune, although I did not mean some goddess to be understood by this name, but the fortuitous outcome of things, whether in our body or in external goods or evils; whence also come those words which no religion forbids us to say: by chance, perhaps, perchance, maybe, haply, fortuitously;19 all of which, however, must be referred back to divine providence."

I did not keep silent on this point there either, saying: "Perhaps what is commonly called Fortune is governed by some hidden order; and in things we call nothing else chance except what has a secret reason and cause, that is, one that lies hidden." I did say this; yet I regret having named Fortune thus in that place, since I see that men have the very bad habit of saying "Fortune willed this" where they ought to say "God willed this." The same, Eighty-Three Questions, q. 24: "Whatever happens by chance happens at random; what happens at random does not happen by providence. If, then, some things happen by chance in the world, the whole world is not administered by providence. Therefore nothing in the world happens by chance." The same, City of God 5.9: "We do not say that those causes which are called fortuitous (whence Fortune too received her name) are nonexistent, but hidden, and we attribute them to the will either of the true God or of any spirits whatever." The same, on that verse of Psalm 9 [9:2], "I will confess to you, Lord, with my whole heart": "He does not confess to God with his whole heart who doubts his providence in anything." "All the torments that are inflicted on the body either train those who have turned to God, or warn them to turn, or prepare the hardened for a just final condemnation. And so all things are referred to the governance of divine providence, which fools think happen by chance and at random and with no divine administration."

The same also, on that verse of Psalm 148 [148:8], "Fire, hail, snow," etc., "which do his word": "Why did he add 'which do his word'? Many, unwilling to contemplate and discern the creature acting out its movements in its own places and its own order at God's nod and command, have supposed that God governs all the higher things but does not care for the lower, does not govern or rule them, but leaves them to chance. But do not consent to these men; for these are blasphemies and abominable to God, since everything on earth happens by the providence of God. In all places, therefore, regions, and temporal things 20 he apportions and ordains to each its own. It would take long to recount the more careful consideration of all things; who can unfold it? Yet those who have eyes see the things seen that please and are praised, and they praise not the things themselves but him who made them; thus they will praise all things. These things, therefore, which seem to be tossed about by chances, do his word, C1 and in all their motion serve the word of God."

The same appears through the Apostle, who says in Ephesians 1: "We were called by lot." 21 For what is a lot but luck, fortune, or chance? But this lot is divine election and will, as is clear there from the Gloss, and from Augustine on that verse of Psalm 30 [31:16], "In your hands are my lots," in his third discourse, where he speaks thus: "God's grace, by which we have been saved, is called a lot; and it is rightly called a lot, because it is not a man's choice but the choice of God's will. It found no merits of ours, but called us to salvation by the lot of his will, because he willed it, not because we were worthy, 'not from works, lest anyone be puffed up': 'For we are his creation, created in Christ Jesus for good works.' This is in a way a hidden lot; the will of God in the human race is a lot, a lot coming from the hidden will of God, with whom there is no iniquity. For he does not accept persons, but his hidden justice is a lot to you." What, moreover, is more chancy or fortuitous than a lot and the outcomes of lots? Yet these are known to be governed by divine will, D1 as the sequence of each Testament plainly shows. So too the Apostles, when about to choose another in place of Judas the apostate, cast lots and said, "You, Lord, show which one you have chosen."

Hence also Proverbs 16 [16:33]: "Lots are cast into the lap, but they are regulated by the Lord." Therefore Augustine too, on that verse of Psalm 30 [31] cited before, says: "'Not in the hands of men, but in your hands': what are these lots? Why lots? On hearing the name of lots we should not go looking for diviners. For a lot is not something evil, but a matter, in human doubt, that points to the divine will. For the Apostles too cast lots." This is also recited in the Canon, 26, question 2, "A lot is not…" 22

Furthermore, for investigating chance and fortune more fully, it seems that each is taken actively and passively: according to efficient agency and according to effect; according to cause and according to what is caused, as was also said above of Fate. Taken actively, according to efficient agency and cause, the Philosopher speaks of them in Physics 2, defining each, "a cause according to accident," etc., written there; and this is also clear especially of Fortune from what has been set out here. That chance is taken passively, according to effect and what is caused, its very name seems to indicate. For "chance" appears to signify passively; 23 for what is chance but what falls from another, as an effect from a cause? Hence we also commonly say, "A marvelous chance befell, or happened to, such a man." Therefore the definition of chance reviewed by Boethius says that chance is an unexpected event from converging causes, in things done for the sake of something else. Augustine, cited above, agrees with this: "In things we call nothing else chance except what has a reason and cause that is secret or hidden." But chance taken actively, according to efficient agency and cause, would rather, as it seems, be called "casuation" or "casuance." 24 That fortune too is taken passively, and according to effect and what is caused, likewise appears from the customary way of speaking. For we commonly say, "A marvelous fortune, prosperous or adverse, befell such a man," meaning that some good fortune or misfortune has befallen him. 25 Hence the Philosopher too, in Ethics 1, showing that happiness does not consist in the goods of fortune, because happiness is permanent and by no means easily changed, whereas fortune is the contrary, says in chapter 15 that fortune many times "is turned about again" around the same persons; "is turned about again," he says, passively. And below, in chapter 16, speaking of the happy man, to whom prosperous or adverse things befall: "Just as," he says, "we all reckon the man who is truly good and wise to bear fortunes becomingly." 26 Hence Augustine too, cited above, says that by the name of fortune he did not mean to signify any goddess, but the fortuitous outcome of things.

Yet further, when what is above has been carefully considered, it seems that fortune taken actively, according to efficient agency and cause, could be subdivided further. For it can be taken for a cause that acts on purpose toward some fixed end and causes another end that was not intended; and this is how the Philosopher speaks of it in Physics 2, and in this sense it belongs only to lower causes and by no means to God, as the preceding showed. It can also be taken for a cause that is secret and hidden from us, producing something beyond our knowledge, intention, and opinion, though not beyond its own; and in this sense it can belong to lower causes and likewise to higher ones, to Angels and to God. Hence the Philosopher, Physics 2, 47: 27 "There are some," he says, "to whom fortune seems to be a certain cause, but one not manifest to the human intellect, as though it were something divine and more blessed." Augustine, City of God 5.9, cited above, also corroborates this opinion; and many of the philosophical and theological texts touched on earlier seem to bear witness to it specifically of God and of the divine will.

But here perhaps someone will raise against me that passage of Averroes, who on Physics 2, 48 rejects Avicenna, because in the first book of his own Physics, chapter 13, he held that something is, and is called, casual because it is casual with respect to one cause, although with respect to another it is necessary. But that is no obstacle, since Avicenna is speaking of the casual in a certain respect and not simply; for in the simple sense, according to him, nothing is casual, as is clear from his own authority, Metaphysics 10 of his work, chapter 1, cited above. Averroes, however, who as is his habit gladly catches a man in his speech, argues against Avicenna's words, not against his meaning, proving that on that ground nothing ought to be called simply casual; and so he concludes only verbally, and nothing in reality, against him.

Hence Proverbs 19 [19:7]: "He who only pursues words will have nothing." Avicenna, therefore, can say to Averroes what Affratagoras once said to Socrates, 28 as the same Averroes recounts from Themistius on On the Heavens 3, comment 17: "If," he said, "your contradiction against me were according to the sense of my intention, it would surely be concluded against me; but since you do not understand the intention of my speech, I do not reckon that it is concluded against me." Yet favoring neither of these, but honoring truth above both, it seems to me that nothing is called by the name "casual" absolutely, according to the common usage of speech among philosophers or the common people, except what is casual with respect to any lower cause of its own known to us, or at least with respect to a principal cause known to us; and not what is casual, that is, outside the intention, of an instrumental and accessory cause of whatever kind. For if someone kills a man with a sword on purpose, that killing is not called casual, though it is outside the intention of the sword, which intends only to descend and cut, and outside the intention of the air, which, intending principally something else, perhaps acts for this only accessorily.